Technology, Acquisition | featured news

Twitter has bought TweetDeck, the desktop and mobile application for organising tweets in handy columns, for more than $40 million in a cash and stock deal, CNN Money reports citing sources close to the deal. But there’s no confirmation from either player in this game: “For all those who might be curious, we continue not to comment on rumors,” Twitter’s global PR account tweeted earlier this morning. There were no tweets at all on the matter from TweetDeck founder Iain Dodsworth.

The acquisition, an effort to gain a foothold in voice and video communications, would be Microsoft’s largest ever.

News Corp's IGN gaming and entertainment property has just acquired Hearst's gaming and entertainment property UGO, we've confirmed with the company. And yes, the move is step one towards News Corp. spinning out IGN as its own property sometime relatively soon, we're told.

Mark Zuckerberg is eyeing the takeover of the much popular Skype, in a deal that might cost Facebook close to $4 billion.

Random House, a unit of Bertelsmann, is buying Smashing Ideas, a digital firm that creates book apps.

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group said it had struck an agreement to buy Flixster, the parent company of Rotten Tomatoes, a website that analyzes movie reviews, awarding films a given number of tomatoes.

Yahoo has acquired start-up IntoNow, a service that enables people to “check-in” to content while watching it on their televisions.

Real estate listings and search site Zillow has acquired Postlets, a online real estate listing creation and distribution platform. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Level 3 Communications Inc. said Monday it will acquire another top long-distance Internet carrier, Global Crossing Ltd., in an all-stock transaction valued at about $2 billion. Both companies operate vast networks of optical fiber. Combined, they would reach 70 countries on three continents.

The Justice Department has cleared, with conditions, Google’s $700 million purchase of ITA.